When I was little and my family would go out for a nice dinner, I would ALWAYS order the same thing. Cesar salad, a diet coke and cheesecake for dessert. It didn’t matter where I was, I could always seem to find my staples. Sometimes I would have to settle for diet pepsi, but I would survive.

So when Eric was telling me that his mom Sheri makes an amazing cheesecake, I decided I HAD to have that recipe! Lucky for me, she wasn’t stingy with it.

I decided my family’s holiday party was the perfect opportunity to try it out. My only mistake was not making two.

For the crust, you will need:
1 ¼ cups graham cracker crumbs (smashing them is a great stress release)
¼ cup sugar
5 tablespoons butter, melted

I suggest making the cheesecake the day before and the reduction about 2 hours before you are going to serve the cheesecake.

Start by preheating the oven to 350 degrees. Then, mix the crust ingredients together and press them into a 9 inch pie plate. Bake for 6-7 minutes.

While the crust is baking, mix together the filling ingredients. Make sure your cream cheese is soft enough or you will have issues mixing. I am a dummy and I used a whisk, but I advise using a hand blender. If you don’t have one, get ready for sore arms.

When it is mixed, cover the crust and bake the filling or 20-25 minutes.

After it has finished baking, let it cool for 10 minutes. I failed at this because I don’t read directions. Read the directions!

While it is cooling, mix the sour cream and sugar for the topping. I know sour cream in a baked dish sounds weird, but it was delicious. Ask the 30 people that had to fight over crumbs of it.

When the cake has cooled, pour the topping over the cake and bake for an additional 10 minutes.
Finally, let it cool until the dish it is in is no longer warm and then place it in the fridge until it is ready to serve.

Two hours before you plan on serving the cheesecake, throw all the ingredients for the berry sauce in a saucepan and cook it on medium/low for 2 hours. All you have to do is stir every so often. Like, every 20 minutes or so. That’s it. Crazy right?